>FEDERALIST No. 9 (Hamilton)                                   .



The Union as a Safeguard Against Domestic Faction and Insurrection

For the Independent Journal.



HAMILTON



To the People of the State of New York:

A FIRM Union will be of the utmost moment to the peace and

 liberty of the States, as a barrier against domestic faction and

 insurrection. It is impossible to read the history of the petty

 republics of Greece and Italy without feeling sensations of horror

 and disgust at the distractions with which they were continually

 agitated, and at the rapid succession of revolutions by which they

 were kept in a state of perpetual vibration between the extremes of

 tyranny and anarchy. If they exhibit occasional calms, these only

 serve as short-lived contrast to the furious storms that are to

 succeed. If now and then intervals of felicity open to view, we

 behold them with a mixture of regret, arising from the reflection

 that the pleasing scenes before us are soon to be overwhelmed by the

 tempestuous waves of sedition and party rage. If momentary rays of

 glory break forth from the gloom, while they dazzle us with a

 transient and fleeting brilliancy, they at the same time admonish us

 to lament that the vices of government should pervert the direction

 and tarnish the lustre of those bright talents and exalted

 endowments for which the favored soils that produced them have been

 so justly celebrated.

From the disorders that disfigure the annals of those republics

 the advocates of despotism have drawn arguments, not only against

 the forms of republican government, but against the very principles

 of civil liberty. They have decried all free government as

 inconsistent with the order of society, and have indulged themselves

 in malicious exultation over its friends and partisans. Happily for

 mankind, stupendous fabrics reared on the basis of liberty, which

 have flourished for ages, have, in a few glorious instances, refuted

 their gloomy sophisms. And, I trust, America will be the broad and

 solid foundation of other edifices, not less magnificent, which will

 be equally permanent monuments of their errors.

But it is not to be denied that the portraits they have sketched

 of republican government were too just copies of the originals from

 which they were taken. If it had been found impracticable to have

 devised models of a more perfect structure, the enlightened friends

 to liberty would have been obliged to abandon the cause of that

 species of government as indefensible. The science of politics,

 however, like most other sciences, has received great improvement.

 The efficacy of various principles is now well understood, which

 were either not known at all, or imperfectly known to the ancients.

 The regular distribution of power into distinct departments; the

 introduction of legislative balances and checks; the institution of

 courts composed of judges holding their offices during good

 behavior; the representation of the people in the legislature by

 deputies of their own election: these are wholly new discoveries,

 or have made their principal progress towards perfection in modern

 times. They are means, and powerful means, by which the excellences

 of republican government may be retained and its imperfections

 lessened or avoided. To this catalogue of circumstances that tend

 to the amelioration of popular systems of civil government, I shall

 venture, however novel it may appear to some, to add one more, on a

 principle which has been made the foundation of an objection to the

 new Constitution; I mean the ENLARGEMENT of the ORBIT within which

 such systems are to revolve, either in respect to the dimensions of

 a single State or to the consolidation of several smaller States

 into one great Confederacy. The latter is that which immediately

 concerns the object under consideration. It will, however, be of

 use to examine the principle in its application to a single State,

 which shall be attended to in another place.

The utility of a Confederacy, as well to suppress faction and to

 guard the internal tranquillity of States, as to increase their

 external force and security, is in reality not a new idea. It has

 been practiced upon in different countries and ages, and has

 received the sanction of the most approved writers on the subject of

 politics. The opponents of the plan proposed have, with great

 assiduity, cited and circulated the observations of Montesquieu on

 the necessity of a contracted territory for a republican government.

 But they seem not to have been apprised of the sentiments of that

 great man expressed in another part of his work, nor to have

 adverted to the consequences of the principle to which they

 subscribe with such ready acquiescence.

When Montesquieu recommends a small extent for republics, the

 standards he had in view were of dimensions far short of the limits

 of almost every one of these States. Neither Virginia,

 Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, New York, North Carolina, nor Georgia

 can by any means be compared with the models from which he reasoned

 and to which the terms of his description apply. If we therefore

 take his ideas on this point as the criterion of truth, we shall be

 driven to the alternative either of taking refuge at once in the

 arms of monarchy, or of splitting ourselves into an infinity of

 little, jealous, clashing, tumultuous commonwealths, the wretched

 nurseries of unceasing discord, and the miserable objects of

 universal pity or contempt. Some of the writers who have come

 forward on the other side of the question seem to have been aware of

 the dilemma; and have even been bold enough to hint at the division

 of the larger States as a desirable thing. Such an infatuated

 policy, such a desperate expedient, might, by the multiplication of

 petty offices, answer the views of men who possess not

 qualifications to extend their influence beyond the narrow circles

 of personal intrigue, but it could never promote the greatness or

 happiness of the people of America.

Referring the examination of the principle itself to another

 place, as has been already mentioned, it will be sufficient to

 remark here that, in the sense of the author who has been most

 emphatically quoted upon the occasion, it would only dictate a

 reduction of the SIZE of the more considerable MEMBERS of the Union,

 but would not militate against their being all comprehended in one

 confederate government. And this is the true question, in the

 discussion of which we are at present interested.

So far are the suggestions of Montesquieu from standing in

 opposition to a general Union of the States, that he explicitly

 treats of a CONFEDERATE REPUBLIC as the expedient for extending the

 sphere of popular government, and reconciling the advantages of

 monarchy with those of republicanism.

``It is very probable,'' (says he1) ``that mankind would

 have been obliged at length to live constantly under the government

 of a single person, had they not contrived a kind of constitution

 that has all the internal advantages of a republican, together with

 the external force of a monarchical government. I mean a

 CONFEDERATE REPUBLIC.

``This form of government is a convention by which several

 smaller STATES agree to become members of a larger ONE, which they

 intend to form. It is a kind of assemblage of societies that

 constitute a new one, capable of increasing, by means of new

 associations, till they arrive to such a degree of power as to be

 able to provide for the security of the united body.

``A republic of this kind, able to withstand an external force,

 may support itself without any internal corruptions. The form of

 this society prevents all manner of inconveniences.

``If a single member should attempt to usurp the supreme

 authority, he could not be supposed to have an equal authority and

 credit in all the confederate states. Were he to have too great

 influence over one, this would alarm the rest. Were he to subdue a

 part, that which would still remain free might oppose him with

 forces independent of those which he had usurped and overpower him

 before he could be settled in his usurpation.

``Should a popular insurrection happen in one of the confederate

 states the others are able to quell it. Should abuses creep into

 one part, they are reformed by those that remain sound. The state

 may be destroyed on one side, and not on the other; the confederacy

 may be dissolved, and the confederates preserve their sovereignty.

``As this government is composed of small republics, it enjoys

 the internal happiness of each; and with respect to its external

 situation, it is possessed, by means of the association, of all the

 advantages of large monarchies.''

I have thought it proper to quote at length these interesting

 passages, because they contain a luminous abridgment of the

 principal arguments in favor of the Union, and must effectually

 remove the false impressions which a misapplication of other parts

 of the work was calculated to make. They have, at the same time, an

 intimate connection with the more immediate design of this paper;

 which is, to illustrate the tendency of the Union to repress

 domestic faction and insurrection.

A distinction, more subtle than accurate, has been raised

 between a CONFEDERACY and a CONSOLIDATION of the States. The

 essential characteristic of the first is said to be, the restriction

 of its authority to the members in their collective capacities,

 without reaching to the individuals of whom they are composed. It

 is contended that the national council ought to have no concern with

 any object of internal administration. An exact equality of

 suffrage between the members has also been insisted upon as a

 leading feature of a confederate government. These positions are,

 in the main, arbitrary; they are supported neither by principle nor

 precedent. It has indeed happened, that governments of this kind

 have generally operated in the manner which the distinction taken

 notice of, supposes to be inherent in their nature; but there have

 been in most of them extensive exceptions to the practice, which

 serve to prove, as far as example will go, that there is no absolute

 rule on the subject. And it will be clearly shown in the course of

 this investigation that as far as the principle contended for has

 prevailed, it has been the cause of incurable disorder and

 imbecility in the government.

The definition of a CONFEDERATE REPUBLIC seems simply to be ``an

 assemblage of societies,'' or an association of two or more states

 into one state. The extent, modifications, and objects of the

 federal authority are mere matters of discretion. So long as the

 separate organization of the members be not abolished; so long as

 it exists, by a constitutional necessity, for local purposes;

 though it should be in perfect subordination to the general

 authority of the union, it would still be, in fact and in theory, an

 association of states, or a confederacy. The proposed Constitution,

 so far from implying an abolition of the State governments, makes

 them constituent parts of the national sovereignty, by allowing them

 a direct representation in the Senate, and leaves in their

 possession certain exclusive and very important portions of

 sovereign power. This fully corresponds, in every rational import

 of the terms, with the idea of a federal government.

In the Lycian confederacy, which consisted of twenty-three

 CITIES or republics, the largest were entitled to THREE votes in the

 COMMON COUNCIL, those of the middle class to TWO, and the smallest

 to ONE. The COMMON COUNCIL had the appointment of all the judges

 and magistrates of the respective CITIES. This was certainly the

 most, delicate species of interference in their internal

 administration; for if there be any thing that seems exclusively

 appropriated to the local jurisdictions, it is the appointment of

 their own officers. Yet Montesquieu, speaking of this association,

 says: ``Were I to give a model of an excellent Confederate

 Republic, it would be that of Lycia.'' Thus we perceive that the

 distinctions insisted upon were not within the contemplation of this

 enlightened civilian; and we shall be led to conclude, that they

 are the novel refinements of an erroneous theory.

PUBLIUS.

1 ``Spirit of Lawa,'' vol. i., book ix., chap. i.





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